


Project Cassandra

by JinxQuickfoot



Series: Whumptoberverse [17]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk (2008)
Genre: Bruce Banner Feels, Bruce Banner Is a Good Bro, Bruce Banner Needs a Hug, Burnout - Freeform, Clint Barton Needs a Hug, Day 17, Gen, Hurt Clint Barton, Natasha Romanov Feels, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, Not Canon Compliant, Recovery, Rescue, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-18 17:06:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29372055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JinxQuickfoot/pseuds/JinxQuickfoot
Summary: The hologram burst to life, and Bruce squinted against the blue light that now filled the common room.Steve spoke first. “Tony,” he asked quietly. “What’s Project Cassandra?”--------------------------------------No one in the Compound is ok. Bruce isn't sure he can fix that, but that doesn't mean he can't try.
Relationships: Bruce Banner & Clint Barton, Bruce Banner & Natasha Romanov
Series: Whumptoberverse [17]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1921831
Comments: 92
Kudos: 58
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	1. Previously, on the Whumptoberverse...

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back! And much recovered from my burnout, although I have missed you all so very much. Thank you so much for your patience over the Whumptoberverse hiatus.
> 
> As we're just coming back from said hiatus, and this fic is pretty plot heavy, I'd thought I'd welcome you all back with a quick (or at least, it was meant to be a quick) summary of the road so far...
> 
> Spoilers ahead for every fic in the Whumptoberverse.

_ After the Tony vs. Steve and Bucky fight in Siberia, Steve and Bucky were picked up by T’Challa, leaving an injured Tony behind. Helmut Zemo captured both Tony and Peter (who had followed Tony to Siberia and had his suit knocked out by an EMP), before threatening Tony to get Steve and Bucky to return, minus T’Challa. This turned out to be a trap, with Zemo using the Winter Soldier’s trigger words on Bucky and forcing Steve to choose - Tony’s life or Bucky’s. Instead of choosing between his two friends, Steve attempted to shoot himself (which would have jolted Bucky back to himself and saved both him and Tony) but was saved at the last moment by Peter escaping from Zemo and grabbing the gun away from Steve. T’Challa returned and took Bucky and a captured Zemo to Wakanda, while Steve returned with Tony and Peter to the States to try and amend the Accords and free their friends from the Raft. _

_ Six months later, the Accords had been heavily amended and the Avengers had returned to the Compound, with three exceptions. Bucky remained in Wakanda to recover with Shuri and T’Challa, Wanda decided to remain a vigilante and not sign the Accords after her release from the Raft, and Vision faked a report that Tony had decided to ‘shut him down’ when in fact he had left the team to be with Wanda. Ross was still chair of the Accords Committee, mainly dealing with Tony and Rhodey over the various amendments. S.H.I.E.L.D. was replaced with New S.H.I.E.L.D., with Maria Hill taking over as Director with Nick Fury still being officially dead. After the events of Siberia, Tony tried to keep Peter at an arm’s length before Peter took down the Vulture and proved himself to Tony, and took him up on his offer of being an official Avenger and being given a room in the Compound. _

_ Despite the team being pardoned, however, all is not well. While the rogue Avengers’ house arrests have been lifted, they are still heavily encouraged to remain at the Compound when not on missions and to stay out of the public eye as much as possible. Tony and Pepper (now working only as business partners, with no romantic attachment), have been doing much of the heavy lifting in strengthening public positive attitudes to the Avengers, who now appear weak and ineffective to both those who supported the Accords and those who derided them. _

_ It didn’t take long for some unsavory individuals to take advantage of this. Sam (mistaken for Rhodey) was grabbed, presumably for ransom before being rescued. Peter was taken only a few weeks later, with his kidnappers demanding money and access to Tony’s computer server in exchange for his safe return. At Rhodey’s encouragement, Tony refused to pay out to protect Peter from similar incidents in the future. While he worried that this decision might have cost Peter his life, on the third day a conversation with Steve led Tony to work out that Peter had been under his workshop floor the entire time, buried alive. The two worked with Rhodey to get him out in the nick of time. _

_ During the search for Peter, Natasha brought in and questioned one of Toomes’s known associates, Mac Gargan. It became clear that while Gargan wasn’t responsible for Peter’s kidnapping, he had been scoping out the Avengers Compound for a potential weapons heist. In the excitement of Peter’s rescue and recovery, Gargan escaped. New S.H.I.E.L.D. managed to track him to a forest in which deadly creatures were being used as unwitting guard dogs for Gargan’s operations. Unaware of the danger, New S.H.I.E.L.D. sent in Natasha, Steve, Clint, and Sam to arrest Gargan. The mission went terribly wrong when an EMP knocked Sam out of the sky, causing serious injury to Clint and Sam’s capture. Natasha managed to save the day, but Gargan got away with her Widow Bites, Clint’s bow, and Sam’s wings. There were also signs around the camp that they were used to effectively transporting human cargo as well as weapons.  _

_ During this mission, Tony was having his monthly meeting with Secretary-General Ross to discuss the Accords, when Ross brought in a young enhanced woman, Aceso, to turn over to the Avengers for assessment. Tony took her back to the Compound but was distracted by the alien spaceship in the landing zone that revealed one Bruce Banner, emaciated and exhausted but alive, after being gone from Earth for eighteen months. Despite Tony’s initial excitement at having someone else he could call a friend around the Compound, Tony and Bruce had a falling out when it was revealed that Tony had worked with Ross. Not trusting Ross or the Accords, Bruce decided to leave the Compound and go back on the run. _

_ Meanwhile, the Avengers had taken Aceso in, adhering to Amendment 9a of the Accords that any new enhanced would remain under their watch until they were proven to not pose a threat. At that point, they would either be made an official part of the team under the Accords or released back into the world with an assurance that they would never use their powers, lest they face imprisonment. Aceso’s powers were revealed to include enhanced strength and physical reversal: being able to put a body into any state it had been in previously (although she cannot de-age). She reversed Rhodey to before his spinal injury, Clint before the accident that caused his hearing loss, and Bruce before his gamma radiation, eradicating the Hulk. _

_ After Aceso had been staying at the Compound for a week, and on the night Bruce had decided to return to a life outside of government watch, Aceso and three other enhanced attacked Tony in his workshop. Their various powers revealed that they were the ones who buried Peter alive; Melinoe, who could change matter to solids, liquids, or gasses, Janus, who could magically lock or unlock doors, and Hermes, who could teleport. Any time she teleported (or ‘jumped’) it would take down the technology around her, and also knock out any person she teleported with her. Aceso once again demanded access to Tony’s server, reversing his body through his arc reactor surgery to motivate him. She revealed that Ross had kept her and other enhanced illegally on the Raft for years, and blamed the Avengers for not doing more to stop it, and then backing the Accords which supported such abuse of enhanced people. She stated that her plan for the information on Tony’s server would make the world safer for anyone who was enhanced. _

_ Bruce, who had come to the workshop to make up with Tony before he went back on the run, interrupted them and convinced Aceso to use him as leverage instead of continuing to torture Tony. Just as Tony was about to open the server, Clint, Steve, Sam, and Rhodey came to their rescue. After killing Janus unlocked the doors, Rhodey distracted Aceso long enough for Natasha to sneak in through the vents and shoot her. With Aceso dead, everything she ‘reversed’ righted itself, meaning Tony and Bruce were healed and out of danger, but Rhodey once again lost the use of his legs and Clint his hearing. In the chaos, Melinoe and Hermes both managed to escape. _

_ Later, Tony and Bruce finally discussed how Bruce had starved for eighteen months in space, unable to die as the Hulk, before being saved and returned to Earth by Carol Danvers. Bruce still wasn’t sure if he was going to stay at the Compound, even if Ross was arrested, because he couldn’t morally put himself under government surveillance with the damage the Hulk can do - even if he can’t get the Hulk to come out anymore. With that in mind, Tony and Steve took on the Accords Committee and Ross’s replacement, Assistant-Secretary Michael Harding. They landed on the arrangement that a full-scale investigation would be launched into both Ross and the Raft, a deal struck for Wanda if she decided to come in quietly, and for Bruce to stay on as a consultant only, meaning he didn’t have to sign the Accords. In return, Steve agreed to bring Bucky back to the States so he was under the Accords’ eye, with the promise that he’d be a free man after six months of house arrest if he passed his evaluation. Natasha traveled to Wakanda to bring a reluctant Bucky back to live at the Compound. _

_ After Ross was arrested, the illegally detained enhanced were released from the Raft and set up at Avengers Tower, which was turned into a kind of halfway house under New S.H.I.E.L.D.’s supervision. Thinking the danger from Aceso and her friends had passed, Tony agreed to let a teenager from his past, Harley Keener, come and live at the Compound after his mom kicked him out for being gay. Peter and Harley didn’t immediately gel, with each feeling jealous over Tony’s connection and affection to the other. They were forced to ally together when they were kidnapped by Hermes and her brother, Cratos, who had a superpower that allowed him to steal all of Peter’s Spider-Man abilities. Harley and Peter learned that Hermes and Cratos had kidnapped them to trade for Melinoe, who they believed the Avengers were holding captive. _

_ After a trade had been struck, Harley was returned to Tony but Cratos, who wanted to keep Peter’s powers permanently, decided to hold onto Peter. Peter almost escaped on his own but was recaptured just as the Avengers showed up to rescue him. The Avengers managed to capture Hermes but Cratos used Peter as a hostage to run away into a snowy forest, with Peter convincing Tony to trust him - that he had a plan to get free himself. Sure enough, Cratos eventually collapsed from the cold, unable to thermoregulate, and the Avengers were able to arrest him using Tony’s power-dampening technology, returning Peter’s powers to him. Back at the Compound, Tony sent Harley off to Clint’s farmhouse and severed all personal ties with Peter for the same reason - Peter had been kidnapped to get to him twice, and he refused to let it happen again. Peter was upset but was soon distracted from a phone call from Melinoe, who had broken into Ned’s house. _

_ Peter raced across the city to Ned’s home, only to find that Ned was ok and Melinoe had called for help to rescue Wanda, who was bleeding out in Ned’s bathtub. The wound was caused by a weapon designed to hurt enhanced and had the same golden glow as Tony’s technology. Melinoe refused to let them take Wanda to a hospital or the Compound, saying it was too dangerous - and not just for Wanda. Peter convinced Melinoe to let him call Bruce and, under Bruce’s supervision, he and Ned managed to save Wanda’s life. Melinoe revealed that after the incident with Tony and Bruce, she left Aceso’s group and joined Wanda (who she calls Hecate) instead, saying she believed in Aceso’s mission but not her means. Wanda refused to tell Peter what she was doing, except that Gargan and his weapons were involved, and that, if he wanted answers, he should look on Tony’s server. _

_ Vision arrived in human form and flew Wanda and Melinoe away, but not before Bruce convinced Peter to give Wanda his number in case she needed medical assistance in the future. Bruce also told Peter to call him if he gets hurt and is avoiding the Compound because of Tony. Finally, Peter reflected on how awful it felt when he thought Ned was in danger because of him and wondered if that’s how Tony feels when he’s in danger. Peter left a voicemail for Tony, saying he understands, but Tony only got through half of it before an alert that bug-like aliens were attacking the city.  _

_ The Avengers came out of the fight mostly unscathed, except for Clint, who had several severe lacerations up one side. This left Tony to rescue Clint from an Accords-friendly doctor who was mistreating him. Both Avengers found new allies in Dr Ali Hara and nurse Fahd Nazari who, with Tony, managed to calm Clint down enough to get him treatment. The incident brought Tony into loggerheads with Harding once again, when the Assistant-Secretary told Tony he couldn’t fire the biased doctor as she was appointed by the Accords Committee, who decide the staff in the Compound. Pepper saved them by offering the doctor a lucrative research position in Switzerland instead. She prompted Tony to talk to Clint while reminding him that she and Tony were due a conversation as well. Tony and Clint finally discussed their actions during the Accords and, while they both stood by their actions and didn’t apologize to each other, they found common ground and somewhat mended their relationship. Later, Tony found out that Clint had given Hara approval to make Tony one of his medical proxies, showing that he trusted Tony to have his back. _

_ Despite making amends with Clint, Tony has still been isolating himself from the rest of the Avengers with the exception of Rhodey. Rhodey has been putting up a brave front for Tony’s sake but hasn’t been dealing with his spinal injury as well as he’s been letting on. Peter was caught trying to sneak into Tony’s workshop to look at his server, which Tony had trusted him with access to, which revealed to the team that Tony had been keeping files on Hydra’s Winter Soldier programming. Tony and Steve started to fight, with Steve pointing out that this information was probably what Aceso was after, but Rhodey interrupted and sent everyone out but Steve. The two had a heart-to-heart where Steve admitted that he’s been thinking of hanging up the shield, and had been considering Rhodey as his replacement. Rhodey quickly turned him down, saying he likes having a life, and that Steve is allowed to have one too. _

_ The negative public attitude towards the Avengers hasn’t changed. Tony was attacked at an awards ceremony for Spider-Man, with the attacker covering him in tar that nearly suffocated him. The attacker was arrested but wouldn’t give up why he did it or if he was working alone or not. A few weeks later, the Avengers Tower - where the enhanced from the Raft had been staying - was set ablaze. The Avengers were too late to save anyone, with Natasha receiving severe burns after she tried to protect a fourteen-year-old enhanced. She was only saved after Steve rushed in after her, leading Tony and Rhodey to their location. Steve encountered Sharon Carter at Natasha’s bedside, who told him she was still interested in a romantic connection with him, but that she wasn’t going to wait around forever. _

_ Meanwhile, Bucky has been in the process of recovery and adapting to life at the Compound. While he very much misses the freedoms he had in Wakanda, he’s trying to make it work for Steve’s sake, although he doubts the government is ever going to let him out of their sight. He has also been avoiding Steve, with the exception of visiting Steve in the med bay after the fire, and has been helped through his transition mostly by Clint. One day during training, Clint discovered that Bucky had an injury that he needed medical treatment for. Understanding Bucky’s aversion to doctors, Clint took him to see Bruce. They found Peter instead, who was hiding in a cupboard and refusing to come out. Clint and Bucky end up fighting against an enhanced sociopath with the power of mind control who went by Kilgrave, who had come to the Compound to have Bruce make him stronger. Both Clint and Bucky were resistant to Kilgrave’s powers, as their previous exposure to mind control had inoculated them. _

_ Clint and Bucky teamed up to take down Kilgrave and rescue the rest of their team, which led to Bucky having to fight a mind-controlled Tony. Bucky confessed to Clint that he felt guilty over trying to save himself in Siberia - about fighting back when Tony attacked him. Clint replied that that was a good thing - that you need teammates with strong preservation instincts to watch your back. Kilgrave then called Clint and Bucky into the lab where he was holding Steve and Natasha hostage and had Bruce use Bucky’s blood to make him stronger and able to control people who had broken free from mind control before. However, Kilgrave failed to note that Clint had removed his hearing aids, and therefore couldn’t hear anything Kilgrave was telling him to do. Leaving Bruce to look after Bucky, Clint managed to defeat Kilgrave by waiting for Natasha to collapse from her still-healing fire injuries and then shooting him with an electrified arrow.  _

_ With Kilgrave sent back to Raft, Clint tells Bucky not only that he has a wife and three children, but an open marriage, essentially asking Bucky out. Bucky is attracted to Clint but realizes that kind of relationship is still a bit much for him - at least for now. However, Bucky’s confidence has grown after spending time with Clint and their discussion over what it means to truly have a friend’s back. This finally prompted Bucky to talk to Steve, confessing that he’s too scared to come to Steve for help as he’s worried that either Steve will throw everything away to make Bucky his only priority, or that Steve will end up sacrificing himself for a noble cause and Bucky will lose him for good. Bucky brought up Steve choosing to sacrifice himself in Siberia, even though Bucky had explicitly told him to take him out if anyone tried to turn him into a weapon again. Steve said that, if the situation was repeated, he would make the same choice, leaving him and Bucky at odds and their friendship in jeopardy. The morning after the argument, Bucky decided to phone Clint to say that actually, he is ready to try for more in their relationship, only to hear Clint get grabbed over the phone. _

_ Clint was put through multiple simulations by unknown captors, who used a strange machine to try and pry information out of him. While at first, Clint believed that this was about Tony’s technology again, a particularly long and elaborate simulation revealed to him that his captors actually wanted him to give them Wanda’s location. Clint remained in the final simulation for what he believed was six months, waiting for the opportunity to kill a fake Natasha and thereby breaking the mind-machine. He woke up to the real Natasha, who had come to rescue him. She informed him that his captors have only had him for two hours. While Clint said he didn’t give them anything about Wanda, he did let slip about the farmhouse. Natasha called Maria, who made plans to fly Clint’s family out to the Compound. Natasha drove Clint back to the Compound to figure out who grabbed him, and why they were so interested in Wanda… _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're liking the work I'm putting out on Ao3 and want to support me as a creator elsewhere, it would mean the world to me if you were to check out my writing podcast 'Kill the Cat', which is available on [YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ypaen3yM5Q&t=1s&ab_channel=KilltheCatPodcast), [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/show/5hCprc9UCBZP4srFrBXKT1?si=VeMJEMn8SXOm2FiRCNkN0g), or anywhere you listen to podcasts and hit that subscribe button, or my web series 'Codependent' which can be viewed/subscribed to [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_EF7OOOYPU&list=PL-sJO_AxBYjddRzm1Q6F9Wb99ea_R2ju1&index=2&ab_channel=CatSole).


	2. Part I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whumptober 2020 Day 17
> 
> Prompts: Dirty Secret/Wrongfully Accused
> 
> Relationship: Bruce & Natasha (with some bonus Bruce & Clint)

There was a time when Bruce Banner would have given anything to be invisible.

Invisible would have hidden him from a father’s fists. Invisible would have kept him and Betty safe from Ross’s weapons. Invisible would have kept S.H.I.E.L.D. off his back. 

Not that he regretted his presence in New York. Hulk-related damage aside, he knew that the others would have fared much worse without him. And maybe Thor would have caught Tony on his fall back from space, but Bruce didn’t like considering ‘maybes’ when life managed to hand him something good.

Still. There was a time when invisibility would have been a gift. In some ways, it still was. Ross was in prison. The Accords Committee seemed content to leave him alone. He’d managed to remain neutral over the deep chasm that had split the Avengers in two. It was as if the moment the Other Guy had finally been removed from his life, hibernating deep within him with no plans to emerge, Bruce had ceased to exist along with him.

After the drama of his return and Aceso’s attack, Bruce had been happy to be benched and keep out of everyone’s way. Company had been a lot in the beginning. _Everything_ had been a lot. It had all felt too loud, too bright, too crowded. He was constantly tired,in a way no amount of sleep seemed to fix, and having to recover from a year and a half without food wasn’t helping.

Not that he was sleeping much anyway. He’d slept plenty on that aircraft, far too small for the Other Guy’s body, drifting through the galaxy. There hadn’t been much else to do for eighteen months in space, unconsciousness the only escape from the gnawing pain in his stomach. Usually, when the Other Guy was in control, Bruce was relegated to the background until the point of waking up, exhausted (and usually naked), with no idea of how he had gotten to his new location. It hadn’t been so on the jet. He’d been present throughout. Not enough to take back control, but enough to recognize the starvation ravaging but not killing his body.

He had never liked having the Other Guy in his life. He hadn’t wanted to spend hours on meditation and breathing exercises, or spend months on the run, or years in fear of someone like Ross ripping him apart and using the pieces for destruction in the name of peace. But they’d been the only company the other had had up there. The only company they would have had for a much longer time if Carol Danvers hadn’t found them. Bruce tried not to think about that, but the days passing with little in the Compound to distract him hadn’t helped. The experience had been terrifying and agonizing and lonely, and Bruce hadn't blamed the Other Guy for not letting him blackout.

But he could blame him for abandoning him now.

Bruce has heard from Hulk once since Carol had brought them back to the Compound, and that was ony to tell Bruce that it was fine for Aceso to get rid of him for good. Then he’d checked out. In some ways, Bruce knew he should be relieved. He’d been wanting this for years. He had tried for every solution under the sun only to be handed one with no side effects, no risks. Hulk was gone. Bruce was on his own.

Bruce was very much on his own.

He had spent the first week back on Earth in a constant state of overwhelm; the loss of the Tower, the Accords, the fractures in the team that seemed so far beyond repair. The Avengers had had too many problems for him to add another one, so he’d packed his bags, and planned to run. Again.

Now, a few months into his return, he had to admit that running would have felt a lot less lonely than this.

He’d tried in the beginning, once the idea of people had stopped feeling so overwhelming. He’d slipped into the common rooms where the other Avengers were gathered, only to get lost within five minutes of their conversations, never knowing who or what they were talking about. They’d tried to explain when they noticed him looking lost, but they’d had to do it so often that he’d gotten into the habit of pretending to know while hastily trying to put pieces together himself. It was exhausting, and soon he ended up avoiding group conversations altogether.

That left individual company and, if Bruce was being honest, that hasn’t started off much better. Confessing to Tony what had happened to him in space had felt like a load being taken off his chest, only for Tony to make a point of avoiding him since. Bruce had tried a couple of times to breach that barrier, but it hadn’t taken him long to quit those efforts. If Tony didn’t want him around, fine. He wasn’t going to force him.

Steve wasn’t any more present, even if their leader’s efforts weren’t nearly as deliberate. Bruce had barely seen Steve outside of the Kilgrave crisis. The man seemed to be constantly working, always on his way to somewhere else. Bruce wasn’t about to slow him down, even though a blind man could see that the super-soldier was in dire need of a long-overdue vacation.

He had thought he had had a friend in Natasha, but she had been pointedly avoiding him even more effectively than Tony had since the Tower fire. Unlike Tony, there wasn’t a clear reason why. He had dropped by a couple of times while she was in recovery, but had only gotten to see her once, early on, while she was unconscious. She’d turned him away the other times, and that was her business. Besides, she had Clint, and a blonde woman Bruce had come to know as Sharon Carter, as constant visitors. She didn’t need another.

Clint wasn’t around much either, splitting his time between the farmhouse, Natasha, and Bucky. Bruce had never gotten to know Rhodey very well, or Sam or Scott at all. Both Pepper and Maria Hill had stopped by in the weeks immediately following his return to Earth, each insisting they catch up properly over lunch. Bruce had politely thanked them, then hadn’t followed up on either offer. He couldn’t imagine how busy either of them were, each running their respective companies and managing the daily crises that came with each. They had better things to do than taking him on pity outings. 

It had gone on for weeks, with Bruce slowly fading into the background. He’d tried to make himself helpful in the Compound’s medical bay, but the Accords had prevented him from doing so. Helen Cho, the only known face there, had never quite forgiven him or Tony for wrecking her original cradle, and hadn’t sided with him when he pointed out that he wasn’t Accords-sanctioned but he had been invited to stay as a consultant. The argument went unheard and, with that last avenue into some kind of purpose around the Compound extinguished, Bruce had retreated into his lab and stayed there.

He kept reminding himself that it wasn’t so bad. It was peaceful, even. He’d been on the run from Ross and others like him for years, which hadn’t allowed for any long-term companionship. He’d prayed for this in space, to just have a moment to himself, away from the Other Guy’s mind and control. Now he had all the time to himself that he wanted. 

Then he’d received a phone call from one Peter Parker. 

The circumstances of the call had not been ideal, as Bruce had received a crash course on why Tony complained that Peter worsened his already weak heart. Peter had laid out, in casual cheeriness, that he had given himself stitches before (multiple times), had had another high schooler give him a blood transfusion (also multiple times), and was currently sitting next to a bathtub full of injured Avenger (that at least seemed to be a first).

Bruce had gotten a bit of a shock when Natasha had informed him that they had brought Wanda onto the team, even as that news was delivered amongst all the other bombshells she had handed him at once. The last he had seen of the Sokovian, Bruce had an arm around her with a warning to not piss him off, still reeling from the destruction in Johannesburg. But Natasha had laid out the good Wanda had done for them since. Later, Clint had done the same, the same glint in his eye as when Tony talked about Peter, and Bruce wondered when on earth his teammates had become the kind of people who adopted wayward, super-powered teenagers.

Or when they had become the kind of people who beat each other to hell in abandoned Hydra bases.

That had come as a bigger shock even than Wanda. Bruce had been wary of meeting Bucky since he had returned to States, torn between knowing what he meant to be Steve and that nothing that had happened under Hydra had been Bucky’s fault, and also having spent one too many December 16ths with an inebriated, grieving Tony. Not that anyone had bothered with an introduction, and Bruce had stayed well out of the former assassin’s way until Kilgrave.

He wouldn’t have chosen meeting one of his former childhood heroes as he had knelt, half-conscious from blood loss, on his lab floor, but Bruce didn’t regret the friendship he’d struck up with Bucky since. He didn’t visit very often, and less now that Bucky’s wound had healed over, but it was still…nice. It was nice when Bucky asked him down to visit, or when Peter dropped by the lab to ramble on about an improved web fluid formula or one of Bruce’s papers that he had consumed for ‘light reading’. Peter’s visits didn’t happen all that often, with Peter avoiding the Compound except for when he needed to make upgrades on his suit or web fluid, but Bruce enjoyed them nonetheless. He wasn’t Tony, and he wasn’t aiming for the place Tony had once had (and would have again, if Bruce had anything to do with it) in Peter’s life, but he was glad Peter had someone at his back. The kid was looking more and more tired every time Bruce saw him, vehemently denying that anything was wrong, which was an attitude Bruce had seen from the _other_ engineer with whom he had once spent lab time with. 

Bruce knew from that experience that pushing would only make it worse, and god forbid he push the teenager back into the habit of thinking he had to stitch up his own wounds to save a little pride.

And, if Bruce was being honest with himself, he also didn’t want Peter to stop visiting the lab and take away one of the two conversation partners he had left.

He was so used to spending his days on his own by now that the lab door crashing open would have been a near-suicidal move if the Hulk had still been an element to worry about. Bruce almost dropped the stack of notes he’d been perusing, peering up over his glasses as Steve burst into the lab. The captain was carrying the usual level of determination that Bruce associated with a mission, combined with the exasperation of a team that was not ready for said mission.

At least some things hasn’t changed.

Bruce was not in any way mission-sanctified, let alone mission-ready, but if Steve needed his help then damn the Accords, he could - 

“Is Tony in here?”

Right. Of coursed Steve wasn’t looking for him. “Why would he be in here?”

Steve gave him an odd look, about to say something, before seeming to think better of it and switching back to mission mode. “I can’t find him, and apparently he’s told F.R.I.D.A.Y. to give me _nothing,_ so -”

He was already closing the door as Bruce stepped out from behind his workbench, shoving the notes aside. That research could wait. “Steve? What’s going on?”

Steve blinked back at him, as though he’d forgotten Bruce was there. “Someone took Clint.”

Bruce’s heart dropped. With the Avengers having the enemies that they did, one of them getting grabbed was a more common occurrence than any of them liked, but that still never made it easier. 

“We’re going after him but we need Accords approval,” Steve continued. “Which would be a lot easier if Tony was the one asking and he’s _ignoring_ -”

He didn’t get any further before F.R.I.D.A.Y interrupted him. _“Boss has entered the third-floor common room and is gathered with the other Avengers.”_ She paused, then reluctantly added, _“He tells me to inform you in these exact words:”_ (Bruce could have sworn he heard the AI hold back an exasperated sigh) _“Actually, Spangles, we’re waiting on you.”_

Steve gritted his teeth, dashing out of Bruce’s lab as fast he’d entered. Bruce hovered for a few moments, unsure. He wasn’t technically an Avenger anymore, and this was definitely Avengers business, and Steve hadn’t actually _told_ him to come. He hadn’t told him to stay put either.

After a few moments of dithering, Bruce made his way over to the lab door. Avenger or not, Clint was a friend, and Bruce wasn’t going to hide away in his lab while he was in trouble.

As he approached the common room, Bruce became aware of raised voices, and sped up.

“I just don’t get when you’re going to learn,” Steve was saying. “The decisions you make affect this team, Tony.”

“Don’t come at me for making decisions that affect the team,” Tony fired at back as Bruce rounded the corner, bringing his former teammates into sight. Tony was on his feet, arms folded tightly across his chest, facing off to a semi-circle of Avengers around a large glass tabletop. A dining table, Bruce guessed, although it barely looked used. As though no one had grouped around it for dinner in a long time. “Don’t pretend you had our best interests at heart when you were chasing your lost-long murder pal around on his Contiki tour.”

Steve was on his feet too, directly across from Tony, with Sam and Rhodey sitting either side of him. Sam looked wary, as though looking for a place to jump in, while Rhodey was leaning away with one head in his hand. The colonel radiated exhaustion, his eyes on the floor as though he was determined to look anywhere but at Tony.

“Let’s not forget what’s important here,” Sam broke, before Steve could argue further. Or perhaps try to calm things down. Bruce knew from far too much experience that either route Steve took, Tony would make things between them worse, and Steve would walk right into it. Every time. “You two can play with all the measuring sticks you want when Clint is back. Until then, let’s focus on putting together a rescue mission.”

The look Tony threw him was all scathing poison. “Don’t play diplomat, Wilson, it doesn’t suit you. We all know which flag you march under.”

Sam met him head-on. “I haven’t marched under anyone since 2013.”

“Right, because you don’t automatically take Rogers’s side every time.”

“I take the side of the person who I think is right, which in this case -”

Tony cut him off. “We’re not going to be able to rescue anyone if you have those pitchforks pointed in the wrong direction. You have no proof this was my fault.”

“Aceso’s lot went after Peter first,” Steve argued. “Then Bruce, and then Peter _again._ ”

“I’m right here,” Bruce offered. The statement was ignored, making Bruce doubt its validity. He tapped his hand against the table, half-expecting it to sink right through.

Steve was finished. “And now whoever is out there probably has Clint -”

“There’s no one else out there! That teleporting woman and her brother were the last ones. We’ve had no incidents since and -”

“- all because you insist on holding onto information you _know_ is dangerous.”

“I deleted the Winter Soldier files, remember? You were _there._ Or is that centenarian brain finally catching up to you?”

Steve didn’t buy it for a second. “Right. Because _Code Loki_ was so convincing. Come off it, Stark.”

Tony narrowed his eyes in response. “Code Loki for _get it the hell away for good._ Rhodey was there when I came up with it.” He shot Rhodey a look as though to say, _Come on, tell them._

Instead, Rhodey said quietly, “You’ve lied about this before.”

The five words were enough to knock the air out of Tony’s bravado. The man seemed to shrink, making the oversized dining table seem even more vast and empty. 

“We can talk about this later,” Sam stepped in, taking advantage of the break in the fighting. “But right now, if they’re after the server and the Winter Soldier files, that narrows down who we’re looking for.”

Tony seemed to realize his arms were crossed tightly over his chest, because he swung them open before activating his watch, the hologram spilling out of it the size of a flatscreen TV. “Right, so I’ve been keeping dangerous files that keep endangering our team, right?” Tony said lightly. “F.R.I.D.A.Y., be a dear and show the class everything on my private server right now.”

_“Are you sure, Boss? This format is not as secure as -”_

“Doesn’t matter,” Tony cut her off. “It’s nothing the public isn’t going see in a few months anyway. Don’t be shy, give them the whole show.”

The hologram burst to life, and Bruce squinted against the blue light that now filled the common room.

Steve spoke first. “Tony,” he asked quietly. “What’s Project Cassandra?”

Tony didn’t get a chance to answer. At that moment, the door to the common room swung open, and Natasha was leading an exhausted-looking Clint Barton through the door.

The room went very still, staring at Clint as though he was a ghost. Which, Bruce noted, he may as well have been for all the color in his cheeks. Natasha’s eyes took in the room, the atmosphere, the two clear sides of the argument. “Boys. Why don’t we all take a breath?”

Steve recovered first. “Clint - you ok?”

Clint nodded twice before all but collapsing onto one of the couches on the other side of the room. The setup looked like a perfect place for a movie night, like they’d occasionally have in the Tower when their hectic schedules allowed for it, but Bruce noted that the couches looked untouched, the side tables barren.

There was an awkward pause, and everyone seemed to realize the defensive stances they’d taken up around the dining table. Natasha seemed to see the predicament, because she led the way to the couches, sitting down beside Clint and resting a protective hand on his knee, glaring at the others to follow suit.

Rhodey moved first, sinking into an armchair on Natasha’s left, while Sam took up purchase on the couch angled next to where Clint was slumped. That left Steve and Tony, who both remained unmoving, still locked in their standoff. Bruce was surprised when Natasha didn’t call them out for being childish, when he realized their predicament. Tony was blocking Steve’s way to the couches, and Steve was obviously very reluctant to move any closer to Tony without his permission.

Bruce knew Tony thought he was subtle about it, but everyone had noticed. The way he kept to the opposite side of any room Steve was in. The way he tried to avoid letting Steve get between him and a door. How his fingers brushed his chest every time they occupied the same space.

Finally, Tony gave in, folding away the hologram and pushing off from the dining table, but not giving in so far as to actually sit with the others. Instead he leaned against the wall with the television, so he could keep all of them in sight at once.

Which left Bruce. The couches were large, and each currently bearing only two people apiece, which left one spot beside Clint, and one beside Steve. Besides the hand on Clint’s knee, Natasha was deliberately keeping her distance, which probably meant Clint wanted as much space as they could afford him right now. That left the space beside Steve, which would put him firmly on Steve’s side when Tony was already feeling outnumbered, and Bruce had been so vocal about staying neutral on this mess, and when the hell had choosing a _couch_ _cushion_ become so complicated?

“What happened?” Steve asked, aiming at the question at Natasha. With no one seeming to notice Bruce’s predicament, he made his way over to the gap between the two couches, hovering awkwardly between them. 

Natasha looked to Clint, as though waiting to see if he wanted her to do the brief for him. But after a moment, Clint forced himself upright, choosing to stare at a point on the far wall rather than looking directly at any of them. “Grabbed me,” he managed. “Don’t know who. Something made the hearing aids…” he gestured around his ears. “Too loud. Blacked out.”

“I’ll fix that,” Tony offered automatically.

“When you say something,” Steve continued. “Do you mean a weapon something or an enhanced…something?”

Clint shrugged. Sam leaned in, analyzing him. “Am I the only one who thinks we should be having this conversation around a hospital bed?”

“No hospitals,” Clint refused, a little louder. “I’m fine.” Then quieter, “It was only forty-three minutes.”

“Specific,” Sam muttered, but dropped it.

“Where did they have you?” Steve asked.

This time when Clint hesitated, Natasha stepped in. “Bunker. Only about an hour’s drive out from here.”

That had them sitting up, Bruce included. “Someone with that kind of technology had a base close by?” Sam clarified. “And we didn’t know?”

“Huh.” The single syllable had them all looking at Tony. He surveyed them coolly. “This building was one of Dad’s. Somehow it really doesn’t surprise me that he had some kind of doomsday bunker close by. Old man was getting pretty paranoid at the end there. Although, turns out he had a reason to be, so maybe he wins that round after all.”

Bruce saw Steve’s chest hitch, but Natasha spoke up before he could. “Not a doomsday bunker,” she clarified, cutting a look between Steve and Tony, at the storm still rippling there. “There was barely any security remaining. It looked like it was hidden away for more… unauthorized experiments.”

“Like the super-soldier serum,” Steve said quietly. “Ok,” he said, louder, addressing his first words to Natasha. “Does Hill know?”

Clint shut his eyes at the words, a look of intense regret crossing his face as Natasha squeezed his leg in comfort, affirming, “The important parts, yes, but not all the details.”

“Ok, we’ll brief her,” Steve continued. “We need to find out who had Clint and what they needed Project Cassandra for, if it's in any related to why Aceso wanted it, and -”

Rhodey, who had been stock-still in his chair, suddenly leaned forward in alarm. “Steve, that’s not -”

Clint beat him to it. “What the hell is Project Cassandra?”

The room went very still then as, almost as one, they all turned to Tony. He hadn’t moved from his position against the wall, arms loosely crossed behind his back. “F.R.I.D.A.Y.,” Tony said. His tone was even, but the tension behind the words rippled across the room. “Open up the SI pitch for Project Cassandra. Let’s show the kids what we’ve been working on. You can use the low-tech this time.”

The TV lit up with a professional slideshow, the format of which Bruce had seen dozens of times. It was the format Pepper transformed Tony’s chaotic notes and thoughts into for SI Board meetings. 

“You may not have noticed,” Tony continued drily. “But the public aren’t the peppiest of cheerleaders for our lot right now. Which affects SI’s stock prices, and that makes our shareholders very unhappy. Now, you more gung ho types might not give a crap about that-”

“Tony,” Rhodey warned, but Tony ignored him.

“But those same shareholders keep SI going, which means they keep SI profiting which, guess what, keeps this stylish roof over our heads. So to appease them, and because I felt like maybe at least one of us should be doing something useful…” Tony gestured to the TV screen. “Project Cassandra.”

Steve had gone stock still, watching the screen with trepidation, already sensing his misstep.

“If I have to dumb it down, and in most of the present company I do - it's a faster, cheaper, and, most impressively, _greener_ version of 5G.” He waved his hand at the screen, the slides flicking along with the gesture. “If you really, _really_ want to dumb it down - it’s an app. Or, it’s going to be one. The TL;DR version is that an average smartphone puts out about a hundred pounds of carbon dioxide usage over three years, and if 5G gets in before us, that’s going to get worse. You download Project Cassandra - onto any device, not just Starkphones - you can turn off 5G and use our network instead. It was meant to be rolled out two months ago, except for the millimeter problem.”

Tony paused, as though expecting someone to prompt him to explain himself. When no one did, he went on, clearly miffed at the lack of audience interaction.

“5G uses millimeter waves,” Tony went on. “A lot of them. Which is dandy for uninterrupted streaming, but not so nice for all the delicate ecosystems the other big tech heads of the world want to pump radiation into. If you’re interested I can show you the pictures of the poor mutated sparrow eggs that got flooded with the stuff. Now, Project Cassandra lets you be a good little Earth citizen without having to sacrifice your smartphone. I think Pepper has this whole marketing campaign, something about, ‘It’s Your Time To Be The Hero,’ which is a little on the nose if you ask me, but apparently it tested well with audiences and -”

“Tony. Wrap it up.”

Tony shot an annoyed look at Natasha that faded when he saw that Clint was struggling to stay awake.

“To make a very long and scientific story short: you download the app on your phone, and you get the same effect as 5G with one-tenth of the environmental damage. Less, if I can help it, and when I figure out how to make it work without a Hulk-sized dumping of millimeter waves into the atmosphere. Which I would have already, if I hadn’t been a little busy lately.”

The room shifted uncomfortably. It was common knowledge that most of the public and legal burdens of the Accords fall-out had ended up on Tony’s shoulders. Although, Bruce was sure the others would have helped if Tony hadn’t been so adamant that it was best if they all just stayed out of the way and let him handle it.

“Tony -” Steve started, but Tony cut him off.

“No, it’s fine, _Cap._ I get it.” Tony leaned against the wall, clasping his hands tighter behind his back. “Keeping the Winter Soldier files, Ultron.” (Bruce tried not to flinch at that.) “There’s fair precedent. After all, lying to teammates is criteria for the naughty list, right? Or does that rule only apply to me?”

“They wanted Wanda.”

All heads turned Clint’s way at the words. Clint forced himself to look up, the bags under his eyes somehow even more pronounced than before.

“Clint?” Steve pressed.

“After the Raft.” The words came out in a rasp. Clint cleared his throat, then continued. “We kept in touch. Not a lot, just…enough to make sure she was ok. I check in every so often.”

There was a beat of silence as Tony’s eyes darted around the room, taking in everyone but Natasha’s obvious surprise. He let out a low laugh. “Wow.”

“Ok.” Rhodey pushed himself out of the armchair. “Why don’t we take a walk?”

Tony sidestepped him. “Just checking no one has anything to say about Barton keeping in contact with a dangerous vigilante?”

“She’s not dangerous,” Clint snapped back. “Not to us.”

“No?” Tony shot back “Hey, did anyone in here actually read the Accords? Or at least remember Amendment 6c? You know, the one where if any one of us break the rules, we all take the fall for it?”

“Don’t,” Rhodey warned. “Not now.”

Exhausted as he was, Clint wasn’t backing down. “Wanda’s been an Avenger since Sokovia - that means we have her back.”

“At the risk of all of ours?” Tony pressed. “Including the ones not in the room? Say, certain teenagers whose heroic tendencies and spidery mojo which mean they also fall under the Accords?”

“That’s not the conversation we’re having right now.” Steve tried to take back control of the room, but Tony wasn’t having it.

“So it’s totally fine for Barton to put all of us in danger on his off-hours, but Asgard forbid that I do my actual job without you all jumping on my back over an initiative meant to help this fragile little planet we’re supposed to be protecting -”

“Tony,” Rhodey insisted. “I mean it, stop there. Let’s just -”

Tony turned around to face him fully. “No. You don’t a pass here. Don’t pretend like you weren’t on their side five minutes ago they were lining up yours truly as the bad guy.”

“There’s one side here,” Natasha interrupted. “And Accords or not, Wanda’s on it. Which means now we have to find out who wanted to find her so badly that they hurt one of us.”

Bruce frowned a little at the word ‘hurt’, raking his eyes over Clint again. He couldn’t have been gone more than a couple of hours, and he seemed fine except for the exhaustion, but Natasha didn’t elaborate.

“Stark.” The inflection in Natasha’s voice made the switch to last names professional, not accusatory. “They had a machine that they used to get into Barton’s head. We need to know who built it and how it works, and I’m guessing you’d rather pick it up before New S.H.I.E.L.D. demands we hand it over to them.”

Tony looked for a second like he was going to argue further, but apparently the offer of escape was too tempting. After one more tense moment, he gave Natasha a mock salute and headed for the door.

Rhodey was close behind him. “I’m going too.”

Tony made a show of rolling his eyes. “I think I can make it to one of Dad’s mad scientist holes and back in one piece.”

Rhodey wasn’t deterred. “Whoever this was was good enough to grab an Avenger and a highly trained S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, not to mention stay hidden from us in own backyard for god who knows how long. You’re not going on your own.”

“I think I’m competent enough to deal with any nasties still hanging around. Hey, remember that time I got out of a cave, on my own, with a bunch of scraps?”

“Yeah, and I also remember who gave you a ride home. We’re both going.”

Tony looked as though he was going to argue further, but Steve added, “Rhodey’s right. We watch each other’s backs.”

Tony scoffed, disbelieving, but Rhodey just laid a hand on his arm as though to pull him from the room. Tony wrenched out of his grip, but finally got moving, not protesting as Rhodey led the way.

The tension in the room diminished somewhat once Tony had left it, although the heaviness still remained. Steve refocussed on Natasha. “What does Hill know?”

“What she needed to,” Natasha replied smoothly. “She’ll be waiting to discuss next steps.”

Steve took his cue, getting up from the couch. Sam followed suit. “You want backup in there?”

Steve shook his head. “I got New S.H.I.E.L.D. It’s a long shot, but can you get ahold of Scott and see if Pym has heard of any machines like this?”

Sam raised an eyebrow at him. “And are we telling Stark about that decision?”

Bruce saw Steve chew his lip, considering. It was no secret that Tony and Hank Pym didn’t see eye-to-eye on, well, anything. Tony most likely wouldn’t be up for sharing any information on whatever machine they had used on Clint. “Yes,” Steve decided. He glanced over to the TV screen, where the slideshow for Project Cassandra was still glowing. “No more secrets.”

Both Steve and Sam took their leave, as Natasha offered Clint a hand up from the couch. Bruce stepped forward, feeling even more lost than before. “You need anything?”

Clint waved him off.

“Are you sure?” Bruce pressed. “Because we both know you’re not going to see any other kind of doctor.”

“Just tired,” Clint muttered. “Need a few before Laura and the kids get here.”

That was news. Clint had always been adamant about keeping his Avenger and home life separate. Bruce didn’t reply, leaving space for an explanation that neither of them offered.

Natasha went as though to help Clint to the door, but this time he avoided her touch. Natasha hesitated, then decided to respect the dismissal, letting Clint stumble out of the common room. A few seconds passed, while Bruce cast about for something to say. He came up empty. A second later, Natasha was moving too, lightly brushing his arm on the way past.

Then he was alone. Again.

Bruce moved to the common room door, wondering if the best thing to do was to just head back to the lab and stay out of everybody’s way. Then he remembered the exhaustion on Clint’s face, and the flash of hurt he’d seen on Natasha’s as her partner had dodged that final touch. Neither of them were ok.

_No one_ in this building was ok, and he didn’t have a damn clue how to fix it. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t try. 

He hovered in the doorway a second longer, debating which teammate to follow. Eventually, he decided to hope that Clint hadn’t been lying about needing to sleep, or at least that he had gone to see Bucky instead, before making his way over to Natasha’s quarters.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All I could think about when I was writing this was that blooper from Avengers when Joss Whedon walks into the cast and goes 'STOP FIGHTING'.
> 
> Also I planned out this series before Wandavision was released which confirmed Wanda was born in 1989. Honestly, based off the way the team treated her I always thought she was younger, so I’m staying with that, because it makes the Clint & Wanda/Tony & Peter parallels more interesting, at least for this series. 
> 
> Next chapter: Bruce and Natasha talk some things out.


	3. Part II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never had a chapter kick my ass so thoroughly, and it's probably because it's the most personal one I've written so...gear up, folks. Let the whump begin anew.

Bruce was three left turns away from the common room before he realized that he didn’t know where Natasha’s quarters were.

He hadn’t explored that far out of his own private rooms or labs, the furthest being Bucky’s rooms and the med bay. He knew that all the Avengers had their own rooms around the Compound, but it wasn’t like the Tower where they had each had a floor you could arrive at with the push of an elevator button.

“Um, F.R.I.D.A.Y.?”

_“Yes, Dr Banner?”_

Bruce hesitated in the middle of the hallway. He had no idea if Natasha wanted to see him. In fact, she probably didn’t, based on her behavior since the fire. She hadn’t assigned herself a task back in the common room, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t doing something important right now. Like everyone else was.

_“Did you need me for something, Dr Banner?”_

Bruce blinked, realizing he was hovering in place. “Is the security system the same in the Compound as it was in Tower?”

_“Boss has made significant improvements since -”_

“No, I meant…if someone doesn’t want someone to come into their rooms. The same privacy protocols apply, right?”

_“No one is allowed to enter private quarters without invitation unless the occupant requires assistance.”_

“Ok. Good. That’s good. Could you show me to Natasha’s rooms, please?”

Following F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s guidance, Bruce finally arrived outside of Natasha’s door. Even here, he was lost. Did he knock? Ask F.R.I.D.A.Y.? What was the protocol now? 

Before he had to make a decision, the door clicked open. Bruce swallowed, peaking through the gap. It appeared that F.R.I.D.A.Y. had been the one to let him in; Natasha was nowhere in sight. “Does this mean she wants to see me?”

_“Your visit fits within the privacy protocols, yes.”_

_No backing out now_. Bruce eased his way inside, shutting the door behind him. “Nat?”

He was in a living room, almost identical to his own except for the taste. The furniture was a neutral shade of cream; a slightly lighter shade than the walls. Books - mostly fictional paperbacks from a first glance - decorated a set of floating wall shelves that cascaded diagonally like a staircase. Opposite was a large, modernist painting that vaguely resembled a ballerina dressed in red, the colors mixed and swirled into the background. Bruce guessed that the artwork had been chosen by Tony or, more likely, Pepper, from the art collection they had been rebuilding after Tony had donated their first one to the Boy Scouts of America. 

And then there were the plants.

They were plants _everywhere_. Pot plants, desk plants, colorful hangers. Bruce couldn’t help but smile a little at the extravagance; a smile that faded when he saw how badly most of them had been taken care of. While at first glance they still appeared green and healthy, when Bruce leaned closer he saw how the edges of leaves were browning, flowers beginning to shrivel. “Nat?”

His response was a small gasp from the bathroom, followed by a slammed door.

Bruce froze. The Compound still had privacy settings, and F.R.I.D.A.Y. had let him into Natasha’s room, so - 

_No one is allowed to enter private quarters without invitation unless the occupant requires assistance._

In a moment, Bruce was beside the bathroom door. “Natasha? Are you ok?”

He got no response, which made him try the door handle, only to get a faint, “Don’t come in” from behind the door.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y. said you needed assistance.” Bruce had gotten as far as turning the door handle. The door wasn’t locked. She hadn’t been expecting him - hadn’t even heard him come in. Which, given Natasha’s usual levels of perception, meant that he wasn’t going to like whatever was on the other side of that bathroom door.

“Nat?” he tried again, keeping his voice low. “I’m here to help. Come I come in, please?”

He was almost certain she was going to say no. He was already turning over the moral dilemma of respecting Natasha’s privacy versus not wanting to leave her alone if she might be hurt, when he got a quiet, “Ok.”

Bruce had the door open in a heartbeat, only to swallow down bile at the sight in front of him.

“It’s bad, right?” Natasha offered.

Bruce quickly shoved his revulsion aside as he let himself into the white-tiled space. Natasha was sitting on the edge of a large bathtub, seemingly holding her own _face_ away from her head, a clump of bloody hair between her knees.

Bruce’s logical mind finally caught up to what his eyes were seeing, realizing the blonde bob shoved between her legs was a wig. Natasha’s real hair was still the familiar red, although cropped close to her head. At least, in the parts where it had grown back at all. As for the face in her hands, as Bruce moved closed he noted the distinctive shimmer that marked it as S.H.I.E.L.D. issue cloaking mask. It seemed like it had gotten stuck as Natasha had tried to remove it, keeping its flawless form as opposed to transforming back into the shimmery material.

The parts of Natasha’s face Bruce could see were pale and worn, but they weren’t the areas the mask was sticking to. He saw the spy tense as he began to move around to her other side. As he got close she threw out an arm, not looking at him.

“Hey,” Bruce said softly. “It’s _me_. Whatever it is, I’ve seen - I’ve _caused_ ten times worse and then some, ok? Let me help you.”

He counted to five, then to five again, before Natasha finally nodded and lowered her arm. Bruce made his way around her until he could kneel on her other side, and see what was preventing her from taking the mask all the way off. 

“Oh, Nat,” he breathed.

The burns on the left side of Natasha’s face, which should have been on their way to healing by now given Cho’s Cradle, had fused to the mask’s material. Tech was meshed with flesh that Natasha was unable to pull away without ripping her already damaged skin to shreds.

Bruce bit back questions about how this had happened, sensing that Natasha wasn’t up for answering right now. Instead, he set about how he could remove the mask by causing the least damage possible. Which, no matter how he tried to think around it, still seemed like a hefty amount.

“I know you’re going to say no,” Bruce offered. “But just checking that you’re not going to let me take you to the med bay to deal with this?”

Not willing to move her head, Natasha made the ASL symbol for _No_ instead.

“What is it with this team and avoiding professional health care?” Bruce muttered, leaning in closer. The words were meant in jest, not rebuke. It had once been an ongoing joke (and to Bruce, frustration) between the original six of them how their party would refuse to admit they were hurt even as they were trailing blood across the Tower floor, but would fuss and coddle at the first sign of pain from anyone else. “Ok. I’ll remove it here. What do I have to work with?”

Still not talking, Natasha pointed to the bathroom cabinet. Bruce squeezed her shoulder as he got to his feet, assembling his arsenal. (Not) to his surprise, he ended up well-armed. The bathroom cabinet was well-stocked with every kind of painkiller and field drug under the sun, several sizes of medical scissors, antiseptic, and bandages. Not for the first time, he thanked whoever was listening out there that both Natasha and Clint remained so thoroughly paranoid, ready for any opportunity. He gathered what he needed, turning back to find Natasha almost bent double, taking large breaths through her nose.

“You’re ok,” Bruce offered automatically, kneeling back beside her. Natasha's eyes were closed, forcing calm. Bruce was about to tell her that it was ok to cry if she needed to, that he wouldn’t judge her like she was fearing he would, when he realized that salt would sting the already aggravated burns. Besides, Natasha never cried. “Open your hand.” 

He placed two pills in her palm that she dry-swallowed, holding the fused mask away from her face to allow the action. It was off-putting, the way the mask looked more like his old friend than the hurt and scared Natasha right in front of him.

“Those should dull the pain,” Bruce explained. “From what I can see, the easiest way to do this is going to be, um...” He swallowed. “I need to cut away the skin that the mask has attached to.”

The hand not holding the mask balled into a fist, fingernails biting into palm.

“It will all be superficial,” Bruce promised her. “And it’s, um…it’s scarred skin anyway, so we’re not doing any additional…cosmetic damage. Nothing the Cradle won’t fix.”

The next breath turned into a shuddering gasp that she quickly stifled. Bruce laid one hand on top of hers, waiting for her breathing to even out. “I’m going start now, alright?”

She didn’t acknowledge the statement, but she didn’t try to stop him either. That was enough for Bruce to disinfect the scissors, and start cutting.

As Bruce had promised, he didn’t go deep, but that made the cuts all the more fiddly and numerous. The mask was too strong for him to cut through, which means he could only work at Natasha’s skin. He quickly became grateful that they had undertaken this procedure on the bathtub. He could flick any excess flesh onto the once-pristine tub, although most of it clung to the mask as Bruce slowly and methodically removed façade from damage.

Finally, Bruce reached Natasha’s hairline, where the most serious fuse was. Natasha, who had been frozen and rigid the entire procedure, felt his pause. She finally spoke. “Just do it.”

He exhaled slowly, steadying himself.

“Bruce?” For the first time, Natasha locked eyes with him. Some of the steeliness and resolve he knew was back. “Does it need to be done?”

He nodded.

“Then do it.”

The whole procedure took less than fifteen minutes, but Bruce knew that time meant nothing when you were measuring pain. He recalled Clint’s statement of “forty-three minutes”, how exhausted the man trained to withstand any form of torture had looked. “Is Clint ok?” Bruce asked, as he finished disinfecting the fresh cuts on Natasha’s face.

It was the wrong thing to ask. Natasha’s eyes closed. “Sorry. Just…”

“I’m currently rubbing alcohol into open wounds and the most important person in your life just spent two hours in enemy hands,” Bruce reassured her. “You are the last person who needs to be apologizing for anything.” He reached the deepest cut, right at her hairline. “Nearly done. Then I’ll bandage it up. Painkillers helping?”

Natasha stared at the floor. “I’m used to pain.”

After a total of twenty minutes that felt like hours, the bloodied mask and wig were placed to one side, and Natasha’s wounds were cleaned and bandaged. Bruce took in that she was still in her mission suit. “You want me to find you something more comfortable?”

Natasha exhaled, looking wistfully at the ruined wig and mask. “Those aren’t easy to come by.”

Bruce’s eyes found the now concealed wounds. “But you’ve been working with Cho, right? And those cosmetic surgeons Tony hired? So surely you won’t need -”

But Natasha was already moving, disregarding him as Bruce automatically placed himself between her and the bathroom door. He was well used to teammates declaring themselves healed enough to get back to work long before they were. 

“I need to go see Hill.”

Bruce didn’t move. “Isn’t Steve on that?”

“He doesn’t have enough detail,” Natasha explained, already sliding back into her agent persona. “And Clint can’t…Clint needs to rest. So I have to do it.” She dodged him easily, ducking out of the bathroom and making her way back to the living room with Bruce in her wake.

“Nat,” he protested. “Just _wait_ -”

“Tony and Rhodey will be back soon with the machine they used on Clint,” Natasha continued again as though talking to herself. “So they’ll need to take their findings to Steve and Maria, and they’re going to need a buffer. Sam tries but he and Tony just don’t know each other well enough. I have to do it.”

She suddenly changed course, heading for what Bruce assumed was the bedroom instead. He followed her still more reluctantly, not wanting to intrude, but also wanting to knock her out of whatever insane mission mode she was trying to put herself back in.

Bruce hovered outside the bedroom door, watching as Natasha ran her hand over the fresh bandages, heading to a dresser in the bedroom lined with -

“Natasha.” Bruce stepped fully into the bedroom, ditching any concerns about privacy. “I just cut one of those _out of your face.”_

Natasha wasn’t listening, already reaching for a fresh wig and cloaking mask. “They go on fine over bandages,” she answered, although again Bruce suspected the statement was for herself, not him. “I didn’t have time to prepare last time. I waited long enough and I had to…I had to get to him.” She reached for a new wig.

“Don’t,” Bruce pleaded with her. “You’re still _bleeding_ under there, Nat, just take a few hours, _one_ hour, at least.”

But Natasha was completely ignoring him now, fixing the wig into place before reaching for one of the cloaking masks.

_“Don’t,”_ Bruce repeated, before noting how the dresser was arranged. As though it had once held more wigs, more cloaking devices - now discarded. “Jesus, Nat,” he breathed. “How many times -”

Natasha went to pull the mask on over the fresh cuts.

“Damnit Natasha, at least acknowledge that _I’m here!”_

She whipped around to face him, expression morphing into one of calculation. As though she was adding him to the never-ending list of problems she was trying to solve. It was almost enough to make Bruce shy away - he had tried so hard to not be anyone’s problem since he had arrived at the Compound - but then he looked at the mask was still her in hands, at the burns barely hidden by white fabric.

He recalled Cho’s reports. “You should be healing faster than this.”

Natasha had already arranged her features into a more powerful mask than the one in her hand ever could be. “I’m healing fine.”

“Not if…you’re not consistently wearing those masks, right?” He glanced over to the empty spots on the dresser. He suddenly wondered if this was why Natasha had been avoiding him since the fire; if he would have noticed the problem and called her out sooner. “If they’re making the burns worse -”

“I know what I’m doing.”

“Yeah, that’s kind of what I’m afraid of.”

“I was meant to have a session in the cradle today. Cho had to do some prep on my skin including removing the dead cells that can made the burns a little sensitive. Then I had other priorities, and I needed a mask. It’s not a big deal.”

But Bruce wasn’t backing down - not from this. “Ok. Let’s go see Cho. Let’s have a session now.”

Natasha met the challenge. “Other priorities.”

“The team can handle it.”

“You saw us back there. We can barely handle a conversation right now.”

“So you’re going to handle it for all of them.”

“No. I just need to be there to steer them in the right direction. Ok? There’s no one else.”

Bruce folded his arms, leaning against the doorway of the bedroom. “So if one of the team got hurt, you wouldn’t make them rest?”

“I’m not hurt.”

Bruce stared at her, disbelieving.

“I’m not hurt in any way that is impacting my ability to perform,” Natasha clarified. “Alright? Now, I’m going to see Hill.” She seemed to consider something. “No. A phone call won’t work, they’ll just talk right over me. It has to be in person.”

And she went to put the mask on.

Bruce stepped forward, only realizing that it was probably going to be suicide for at least one of them at the last second, and said the words before he had even realized what he was saying. “If you put that thing near your face, I’ll tell Clint you’re injured.”

The words tasted like bile, because this move was so damn dirty, but the mask was still in Natasha’s hands, and dammit if he was going to spend another session with that bathtub and scissors. If she even trusted him to do it again. If she didn’t just do it herself which, by the missing masks and her attitude now, was making the probability that she had done so in the past increase by the second.

“I will,” Bruce promised. “And you know he’ll drag himself up here, and I don’t know what happened in that bunker, but it didn’t take seven PHDs to put together that it was hell. So, do you want to let him rest, or am I calling him in here?”

Bruce had never on the end of one of Natasha’s death glares, and after this he never wanted to be on the end of one again.

He winced. “I’m sorry,” he amended, voice softening instantly. “Sorry, I didn’t mean - Just, Nat, you’re _hurt,_ and I care about you, just…just so much, ok? So if there’s anything I can do to ensure you don’t get hurt worse, you know I have to at least try. And that doesn't stop you from being strong or brave or capable - hell, you’re the strongest, bravest and most capable person I’ve ever met - but right now? Right now you’re hurt and you need to rest. The world won’t stop spinning if you do. _You are allowed to rest.”_

Bruce didn’t know what he expected after the outpouring of words. More arguments or, worse, her going back to ignoring him or, even worse than that, putting him back into the moral quandary of whether he really did want to ask F.R.I.D.A.Y. to summon Clint up here.

What he didn’t expect was for Natasha Romanoff, Black Widow, super-spy, deadly assassin, Avenger, to burst into tears.

There was a stunned moment when Bruce just stood there, half-sure he was hallucinating because Natasha _didn’t do this,_ before emotion took over logic and he was surging forward and pulling her against his chest. They stood like that for a moment, Bruce scanning Natasha for any sign the touch was unwanted, that she needed space. When she didn’t pull away, he steered them over to the bed.

They sat like that for a minute, until the sobs turned into shuddering gasps, and Bruce realized that Natasha was desperately trying to pull herself back together.

“It’s ok,” he assured her softly. “You don’t need to stop yet. This sounds like it’s something that’s needed to come out for a while, yeah?”

That made her cry harder, but Bruce made no attempt to stop it, letting her get it out. He’d been here. He’d been on the run for so long, only focusing on the next day, the next destination, the next shot at a cure. And then one day, it had just been too much. He couldn’t even remember where he had been when he happened. Just that he had found a discarded mattress, some semblance of privacy, and had cried for hours, only realizing when the first tears had come how long he had needed to do so.

He stopped talking after a while, just kept stroking Natasha’s back, noticing that when he tried to speak that she’d try to stop crying again. So he stopped reminding her that he was there.

Sometimes being invisible had its advantages.

Finally, her shoulders stopped shaking, although she didn’t take her head out of his lap. He waited, allowing her to make the first move. When she didn’t take it, he looked around the bedroom, eyes landing on the bedside table. “I can get you a tissue?”

He felt rather than saw her nod, so he carefully maneuvered them so he could pull the box over. She took one, Bruce noting that her fingertips were still tinged with red from trying to get the cloaking mask off.

She turned her back to him as she hastily wiped her face. The wig had slid off some time during her cry and now lying abandoned on the floor. A distant part of Bruce wondered why she had opted for blonde rather than red. Maybe she had just wanted to see someone different in the mirror.

He could relate.

“Sorry,” Natasha mumbled, discarding the tissue and reaching for another one.

“You have nothing to be sorry for.”

“I ruined your shirt.”

“I have plenty of shirts. I actually do,” he added, with a small smile. “Now there’s no Other Guy constantly ripping them up.”

“Yeah, that guy had no consideration for fashion.”

“Or budgets.”

Natasha gave a small laugh. Bruce tensed, waiting to see if she would get off the bed, if they were about to have a repeat of their argument. She didn’t move, either too exhausted, or too worried about Bruce’s words from before.

“I shouldn’t have threatened to get Clint,” Bruce apologized. “That was low.”

Natasha shook her head even as she said, “It _was_ low. I’m almost impressed. Although, I think we both knew you had that in you, Banner.”

Bruce thought back to their first meeting in Calcutta, of pretending to get angry to make Natasha show her hand. “Yeah, well, life on run teaches you all kinds of tricks.” He risked shuffling a little closer so he was better supporting her weight. “I just really didn’t want you to put that mask on.”

Natasha went very still, fingertips ghosting over the fresh bandages.

“I’m not going to make you talk to me about it,” Bruce said quietly. “Not that I think that anyone could make you talk about something you didn’t want to but…I’m here to listen. If you want.”

Natasha nodded, but didn’t make a move to start speaking.

“Ok.” Bruce cast around for something easy to start with. “How did you find Clint?”

Natasha tapped her ears. “Tracking devices. Whoever grabbed him didn’t manage to knock them out.”

Bruce nodded. “Well, at least whoever it was doesn’t have tech to rival ours.” _Yet,_ he didn’t say out loud.

Natasha gave a noncommittal hum. “I didn’t go through the Accords Committee. There’ll be repercussions.”

“You know Tony and Pepper will throw every expensive lawyer they have at anyone who comes for you.”

Natasha’s hands fisted into the bedsheets. “They’re still dealing with the Kilgrave fallout. We’re not looking good at the moment.” She sighed. “This is what we signed up for.”

“From what I heard, it wasn’t exactly voluntary…” Bruce trailed off, realizing that that statement wasn’t quite true in present company. “Why did you sign them? You never said.”

Natasha took her time answering, and Bruce wondered if he’d misstepped. “Ever since I left Russia…” Natasha took a shuddering breath, tilting her head back to the ceiling. “Ever since I met Clint and then Phil…and before then, as well, even though I didn’t know it then…God, I can’t even get _this_ right.”

“I don’t think this is something you can get right or wrong.”

Natasha swallowed. “I just wanted to do something good. _Anything_ good. I know I can’t make up for all the hurt I’ve caused, that I’m never going to wipe out all the red in the ledger, but I thought I could at least try. And I did that by putting myself under S.H.I.E.L.D. By following their rules. By making that compromise. It wasn’t perfect, and neither were the Accords but…”

Bruce waited patiently, letting her find the words.

“Tony said that if we didn’t do it - sign the Accords - then it would be something that would be done to us later. That, or we retire. And neither of those options sounded good to me. The world has always been on the darker side of grey, and sometimes you have to work with that instead of wasting energy struggling against it. Because then people just get caught in the crossfire.” She shuffled back on the bed. “I know you don’t see it that way.”

“I don’t,” Bruce admitted. “But that doesn’t mean your way of seeing it is wrong.”

“Maybe,” Natasha murmured. “It made sense until Germany. Until…”

“Until you couldn’t arrest your friends.”

Natasha sighed. “So much for moral principles, right?”

“I think you’re one of the most moral people I know.”

Natasha brushed the statement off. “The UN wasn’t completely wrong, you know. We are powerful, and power causes destruction no matter what side you’re on. The more we win, the more we establish ourselves as a threat that needs beating. And one day we’re not going to win - not with the team as it is right now. And I don’t want to see what that loss looks like, do you?”

Bruce took a chance. “Maybe. And yeah, we are… _the team_ is a mess. But it’s not your job to clean up after everyone else.”

“No one else is going to do it. It has to be me.” The words sounded like ones repeated often. “I started out on the Accords then flipped to the other side later, so both sides listen to me, at least a little.” She allowed herself a wry smile, half-hidden in bandages. “Never did manage to shake the double agent thing. Sticks in the DNA.”

“It’s still not your job -”

“I’ve made it my job.” The resolve from earlier was creeping back into her voice as she shoved herself off the bed, approaching the dresser. Bruce tensed, hoping another altercation wasn’t on the horizon. “Because it needs to be done.”

“And you can’t do it without looking after yourself too? Less than a week ago Kilgrave made you stand until you collapsed. You can’t keep pushing yourself like this.”

“There’s no other option.”

“You _can’t,”_ Bruce insisted. “Your body won’t let you.”

“My body does what I tell it to.”

Bruce recalled the painting of the ballerina in the living room, spinning and spinning until she dissolved into the background. “That’s not how it works,” he said gently. “You said you were meant to have an appointment with Cho today, right? Why don’t we go take it now? The team can hold themselves together for one evening.”

“Can they?”

Bruce shuffled on the bed. “Honestly? I think if they knew how hard you were pushing yourself because of how they were acting, they would get their act together a lot faster.”

Natasha became a statue. “They can’t know.”

“They’re your friends, they’d understand -”

“No,” she insisted. Her hand curled around the top dresser drawer. “I’m fine. I can do this. I’ve wasted enough time already.”

“You can’t rush recovery. And…” Bruce chose his next words carefully. “You know your recovery would be faster if you actually made your Cradle appointments, right?”

“I don’t have time.”

“Today was an emergency, I get it, but -”

“This is…” She gestured to her face. “It takes hours. Hours where I’m just _lying_ there. And today I finally went, and I committed and was prepped and…and look what _happened.”_

Bruce took those words in, how Natasha’s scars should look better than they did. There was only one conclusion. He kicked himself - and the rest of the team - for not noticing. Natasha may be able to put on an act to fool even enhanced and expert eyes, but that still wasn’t an excuse. “Nat…how long have you been skipping your appointments with Cho?”

In answer, Natasha reached into the drawer, withdrawing a very beaten-up-looking file, as though it had been thumbed through multiple times. She handed it to Bruce.

Hesitant, Bruce took it, heart dropping when he saw the contents.

“Nat -”

“Look at it. Look how many there were.”

Reluctantly, Bruce looked down at the list of dead from the Tower fire.

“Look at these two.” Natasha flipped to about a third of the way through, effortlessly finding the page she was looking for. “Twins. Nineteen. Because we didn’t already do enough damage to a pair of enhanced twins.”

Bruce had a sudden impulse to tell her about Wanda, but sensed now wasn’t the time. And besides, he’d made a promise.

Natasha turned the page again. The file fell open almost automatically, marking it as the page she visited most often. “Read it.”

Bruce adjusted his glasses as he peered over the text. “Bai Chiang. Code name: Dolus. Age…” His voice faltered.

“Fourteen.” In contrast, Natasha’s words had become all hard flint. “He was fourteen. And I wasn’t fast enough, and now he’s dead. One more mark in the ledger.” She pulled the file out of Bruce’s hands, returning it to its hiding place in the drawer. The location made Bruce question if she was supposed to have a copy at all.

“You don’t get to save everyone.”

“No,” Natasha agreed. “But you can learn from the ones you don’t save. And you dobetter.”

Bruce recalled the details of the fire mission report - how Natasha had given away her own equipment to try and save a young boy. “There was nothing else you could have done.”

“I could have been better. I’m meant to be…I could have been better.”

Bruce slowly got off the bed, although he was still careful to give Natasha her space. “There wasn’t any better,” Bruce tried to assure her. “I went over all the reports.” He had. He couldn’t go on missions anymore, insisted he didn’t want to but…well. He read the reports.

“I should have seen it coming. The signs have been there since Siberia -”

_“No one_ saw this coming,” Bruce insisted. 

“I could have saved him sooner.”

“You couldn’t have -”

“If I was better, I would have saved him sooner, and I didn’t, because I was going to go see Cho because…because I wasn’t _enough.”_ Her voice broke on the last word, fresh tears springing into her eyes that she angrily mopped away. “God, what’s _wrong_ with me?”

Bruce risked a couple of steps closer and, emboldened when Natasha didn’t move away, laid a hand on her shoulder. “I hate to be the one to tell you this, but you’re human.”

She shook her head. “I’m marble.”

“You’re _human,”_ Bruce insisted. “I know you’ve been trained to think otherwise - that you’ve been punished for thinking otherwise, in ways I can’t even imagine, Nat, I really can’t. But at the end of the day? You’re just like the rest of us.” He looked down at himself with a chuckle. “Well. Not quite all of us.”

He didn’t move and, after a moment, she laid her head against his chest.

They stayed like that for some time, until Bruce broke the silence. “Do you want a cup of tea?”

As it turned out, Natasha had every kind of tea under the sun, even though most of the boxes remained unopened. Half of them were expired, showing how little time she had been spending in her quarters lately, but Bruce didn’t bring that up. Instead, he dug out a box of Rooibos tea leaves that were only a week past their due date and brewed them both a pot.

“You know you don’t have to do this,” Natasha said as he handed her the mug, sitting next to her one of the cream couches. “I know you’re busy.”

“I’m really not,” Bruce assured her.

She gave a low laugh. “Must be nice.”

“Not really.” He took a sip of the tea, too soon, and winced when it scolded his tongue. “So…back there.” Natasha stiffened. “When you said you could have saved him. You…you weren’t still talking about that kid from the fire.”

Slowly, Natasha shook her head.

“Ok.” Bruce put aside his still steaming tea. “But whoever grabbed Clint only had him for a couple of hours, right? I know he didn’t look…he didn’t look ok, but still two hours really isn’t -”

“There was a machine,” Natasha said, so quietly that Bruce almost missed the words.

“The one Tony and Rhodey are getting now?”

Natasha nodded. “It’s meant to get inside people’s heads. Make them see things. Make them think they’re somewhere else.”

It wasn’t a hard leap of logic for Bruce to get to the next point. “Physically they had him for about two hours, but in his mind it was longer.”

“The final simulation was six months,” Natasha reported with a barely-there waver. “And before that…before that Clint couldn’t even keep track, there were so many.”

_Six months._ Bruce sent a prayer to whoever was listening that Clint had marched his ass straight to Bucky’s room and not gone to his quarters alone, even though he had known the archer long enough to guess which one he would have chosen.

“You said you tracked him the moment Bucky called you?” Bruce asked. “And you found him. I know it was longer for him but…Natasha, even we can’t manipulate time. Yet,” he amended. “I do have a couple of thoughts about -”

He broke off. Natasha had gone very still, knuckles while around the teacup.

“You didn’t go straight after him,” Bruce guessed. When she shook her head, Bruce leaned forward and gently took the still scalding tea out of her hands, placing it on the table. “Because of the Accords?”

Natasha shook her head.

Bruce put the pieces together, remembering what she had said earlier. “Because you were about to go into the Cradle. You…you showed up to take care of yourself, and…”

The air grew heavy between them, and Bruce strategically leaned over to take another sip of tea so he wouldn’t be looking at Natasha when she mopped at her eyes. “I just…” She dragged her sleeve across her face, rough and frustrated. _“Damnit.”_

“Teariness is a very common symptom of burnout,” Bruce offered. “Human, remember?” 

“All too well.”

“He was still only with them for two hours,” Bruce reminded her. “And it took you an hour to get to the bunker. Would a few minutes really have made a difference?”

“Nine minutes and twenty-nine seconds,” Natasha breathed. “Approximately.”

“What was approximately?”

“How long the final simulation was,” Natasha whispered. “The one Clint thought was six months.” She pressed her fingernails so hard into her palms Bruce was surprised they didn’t break skin. “And I spent exactly ten minutes deciding whether to say with Cho and call in someone else, or to go after Clint myself.”

Bruce shunted the tea back into her hands before her nails left puncture marks.

“I could have stopped it. I could have spared him…They made him think he was back in the psych ward. That we were helping _keep him there._ He went through that, alone, because -”

“Because some very evil and messed up people were after Wanda,” Bruce interrupted. “That’s why. No other reason.

“He didn’t even let me…” She trailed off. “When a mission goes south, we always ride the aftermath out together. _Always._ ” She sniffed. “He goes through it with me so he doesn’t have to go through it with Laura.”

Bruce recalled the conversation in the common room. “And now Laura’s coming here. So…so maybe he’s just confused. You know how adamant he is about keeping his family separate from all this. It can’t be easy having to suddenly combine those two worlds.”

It was the wrong thing to say. “He didn’t say…” Natasha swallowed. “Clint would never give the farmhouse up, ever, unless someone…I don’t know how they did that. Maybe if I had gotten there sooner I could have -”

_“Nat -”_

“He gave up on me coming back for him.”

They were the last words Bruce expected to hear. Clint and Natasha had been each other’s rocks through the roughest of oceans. If one was in trouble, the other came to bail them out. Every time. And for Clint to have given up, for Natasha to have lost that trust…

He opened his mouth, about to pour forth a litany of ‘it wasn’t your faults’ and ‘things will get betters’ and a dozen other things he was sure was true, but he also sensed that the truth and a hundred reassurances weren’t what Natasha needed to hear right now. Instead he said, “I’m so sorry. That’s awful.”

A fraction of the tension went out of her shoulders; the acknowledgment of the feeling far stronger than any fix could be. Bruce suddenly wondered how much hurt and pain in the Compound would go away if they all just finally acknowledged that it was there.

“He’ll forgive you,” Bruce said quietly. “Not that I - or Clint, I’m sure - thinks there is anything to forgive. You were taking care of yourself -”

“And look what happened.”

“You can’t put it off forever. The Cradle isn’t magic. That burn damage - and other damage, as well - _will_ become permanent if you don’t take the time to deal with it while you still can.”

“I will. When there’s a good time.”

Bruce let out a mirthless laugh. “I’ve only been back a few months and I’ve seen aliens rain from the skies, been mind-controlled by a British man in a purple suit, and shot _four times._ I’ve read those Accords, all the Amendments they’re trying to make happen. There is _never_ going to be a good time. The only break you’re going to get is the one you give yourself.”

“I can’t afford a break right now. And if that means the burn damage is going to be permanent…there was a time it would have affected me in the field, but we have the cloaking masks now and I…” She cleared her throat. “I mean, maybe it’s…”

“If you’re about to say ‘It’s what I deserve’, we’re going to have some problems, Romanoff.”

She raised a barely-there eyebrow at him. “And what exactly would you do, Banner? It’s not like you could land a hit.”

“Bet I could land another hug.”

She snorted. “Big green rage monster? Nah, we all know deep down it’s all fluff.”

“Thought that’s why you liked me in the first place? Spending my life avoiding the fight because I know I’d win?”

The silence that followed held more weight than Bruce had intended, the hints of playful turning awkward. Of course they had talked about… _it,_ when Bruce had come back to Earth. But he was still reeling from the whole experience, and there had been so much to take in, and they hadn’t gotten much further than, “We’re better off as friends.”

Natasha turned away, making as though to brush a non-existent piece of hair out of her eyes. She was suddenly staring very fixedly at her tea.

“Forget it,” Bruce said quickly. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to bring…any of _that_ up.”

Natasha made as though to rise from the couch and Bruce surged forward, knocking over his tea in the process. They both stared at the dark liquid soaking over the cream couch.

“I told Tony not to choose cream,” Natasha muttered.

“I’m sorry,” Bruce said automatically, getting to his feet. “I’ll grab a tea towel. Where -” He stumbled over to the kitchen, locating one only to turn back to see that Natasha had vanished again. “Nat?”

Bruce turned wildly around, forgetting the couch stain as he darted back to Natasha’s bedroom, feeling a horrible sense of déjà vu as she surveyed her line of cloaking masks again.

“Don’t tell me we went through all that just for us to end up back here.”

Natasha stroked one of the masks. “You did like me too. Right?”

He’d never heard her sound…vulnerable. Well, almost never. The Barton Farm. _I adore you._

“I…did,” Bruce said, slowly. “Of course I did, Nat. How could I not have?”

“Because…” Natasha ran her hand over one of the cloaking masks. “Because I was beautiful, right?”

Bruce froze, realizing his earlier guess of Natasha’s avoidance had been wrong. “Is this…is this why you’ve been avoiding me since the fire? Because you looked…different?”

Natasha ran her hands over the final cloaking masks. “It’s important. No one can know…it’s important. To not show the cracks. To always be better.”

In a second, Bruce was across the room, moving her hand away from the mask to clasp it in his. “Yes, because you were beautiful,” he stated. A look of resignation crossed her face before Bruce pressed on. “Because you’ve been through hell, and you haven’t let it corrode you. Because cruel people have always tried to bend you to their will and make you their weapon and they have _never_ won - they have _never_ beaten you. Because you’re here, and you’re kind, and you’re brave, and…and I’m not good at speeches but please… _please,_ Nat. You’re the most beautiful person I know, and nothing would change that.And you deserve time to look after yourself, because you work _so damn hard_ , and you do it all for other people, and it’s ok too - hey, are you listening to this part? It’s ok to take time for _you._ It’s ok to let yourself heal. That’s the only kind of better there is for you, because the rest of yourself is already the best it can be. You’re enough, Natasha. You’re enough.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, so...friendly reminder that you are allowed to rest and you are allowed to make yourself a priority. You are working enough, you are doing enough, you _are_ enough. 
> 
> See you soon for the Bruce & Clint epilogue...


	4. Epilogue

“No running away this time?”

Natasha made a Scout’s Honor sign as Cho opened stepped to one side, inviting the spy into her office as she looked at Bruce.

“I know I swore never to let you within fifty feet of my Cradle ever again, but I guess for this I could make an exception.”

“I actually have somewhere else to be.”

Natasha seemed to understand because she gave his arm a grateful squeeze as she made her way into Cho’s office. The doctor made to close the door, but Bruce stopped her. “Dr Cho?”

She paused, one eyebrow raised. "I’m busy.”

“I know,” Bruce said quickly. “I just wanted to say that…well, that I’m sorry.”

Cho hid her surprise well, although Bruce still caught it before she rearranged her features. “Better late than never, I suppose. Although I suppose flying off into space is as good a way as any to avoid consequences.”

“I guess I deserve that.” Bruce shoved his hands in his pockets, giving her an apologetic smile. “The Cradle really is an amazing piece of technology, you know. Even Tony said so, which means -”

“Very little to me.”

Bruce snorted. “Of course.”

Cho folded her arms. “I am fully aware of the Cradle’s potential. And your lot let it fall into a hand of a psychopathic A.I. That _you_ built.”

“I know,” Bruce admitted. “And we’re sorry Ultron used your life’s work like that. And…and I’m sorry he used _you_ like that.”

Cho went very still, jaw locking and arms tightening; a defensive front.

“I, um, had my own little run with mind control a week ago,” Bruce offered. “Kilgrave made me do some stuff for him and um…well. Not fun.”

“Not fun,” Cho agreed. “Especially when they want to use your technology for the extinction of the human race.”

Bruce winced. “Yeah. I don’t know if any of the team came to talk to you after -”

“They didn’t.”

“That’s…not great of us. I’m sorry. Really, Helen - I’m so sorry we put you in that position.”

Some of the tension released from Cho’s shoulders. “What’s done is done.” Bruce nodded, thinking that was the best he was going to get, then Cho went on. “But thank you for saying it.”

“I’m sorry it wasn’t said earlier.”

Leaving Natasha in Cho’s hands, Bruce rounded the corner to make sure he was out of earshot before he asked, “Hey, F.R.I.D.A.Y.? Where’s Clint?”

_“In his quarters.”_

“Anyone with him?”

_“No, Dr Banner.”_

“Because he’s asleep?”

_“Also a no, Dr Banner.”_

“Damnit, Clint,” Bruce muttered, already making his way back to the residential area of the Compound. “I think I’m going to need some more directions, Fri.”

Bruce let F.R.I.D.A.Y. guide him to Clint’s quarters, this time barely hesitating as he reached the door. “I think this falls well into the category of ‘needing assistance’, don’t you agree?”

_“I do, although I advise you proceed with caution.”_

“Noted.”

The door clicked open, and Bruce let himself in, calling out as he did so. “Clint? I’m coming in to check on you so don’t…try to murder me, or escape through the vents, or anything, alright?”

He let himself into the living room, the same shape and size as Natasha’s, although without the plants, the cleanliness or, Bruce thought at first glance, any furniture. It took him a second to realize that there were couches and tables about, but they been shoved haphazardly against the walls to make as much floor space as possible. Dishes were scattered across the carpet, which Bruce guessed Tony had made black for that exact reason. They were interspersed with various miscellaneous items including, but not limited to, a plastic toy triceratops, a Rubik's Cube with half its squares missing, and a VHS copy of _Die Hard 2._

“Clint?” Bruce called again, moving further into the apartment, careful not to tread on any of the clutter. As he did so, he noticed the faint scents of deodorant and body wash coming from the bathroom, as though it had been recently used. The door was still open.

Bruce wandered over, finding the bathroom empty, although the mirror was still covered in a light layer of condensation. He made his way out past the kitchen, the sink of which was piled high with used coffee mugs that looked like they hadn’t been washed in a month. Bruce eyed the recently used coffee pot - did Clint just drink straight from it?

Deciding to try the bedroom next, Bruce turned around to find a pair of sharp eyes staring right at him.

He swore and backed into the sink, swearing he saw his fingertips turn a shade of green, if just for a moment. “Did you really have to sneak up on me?”

“You’re in my rooms,” Clint pointed out, the words flat and lifeless.

Now recovered from the shock, Bruce took him in fully. Clint was hanging in his bedroom doorway, still looking awful, the deep bags under his eyes almost comically dark, but he seemed at least to have gotten himself in the shower and found a (somehow) clean t-shirt and sweatpants. Then Bruce noted how red and raw the archer’s arms were. As though he’d scrubbed himself clean, and then kept going. “I came to check on you.”

Clint’s eyes narrowed. “I’m _not_ going to the med bay.”

“And I’m not here as a doctor.” The words didn’t seem to compute, so Bruce tried something else. “You want to try and get a few hours of sleep before Laura and the kids get here?”

The fight went out of Clint’s shoulders as he looked back at the bedroom. “I need to be…when they get here, I need to be…” He made a helpless gesture when he couldn’t find the words.

“And you can’t, um, _be_ if you don’t sleep?”

Clint nodded. Then, “I can’t sleep in the bed.”

The words sounded so sad, so nakedly defeated, that Bruce took an automatic step forward, arms open. “Ok…is it that you can’t sleep, or is the bed?”

Clint squeezed his eyes shut. “The bed,” he said after a beat, which Bruce suspected was only half of the truth.

“Ok,” he said again, looking around the apartment. “No bed.”

Clint watched him suspiciously as Bruce made his way over to the disheveled couch, nudging aside empty plates and a stack of New S.H.I.E.L.D. files that definitely weren’t supposed to be stained with ketchup to make room.

“Blankets?” Bruce pressed.

Clint looked back over his shoulder. “I can get…”

“I got it.” Bruce finished arranging the couch cushions and made his way over to the bedroom, waiting patiently until Clint moved out of the way. “Why don’t you go lie down?

It took several seconds for Clint to actually follow through on the request. The bedroom was dark, so Bruce pulled open the curtains, blinking when he realized it was still daylight out - that Steve had burst into his lab only that morning.

He tugged the blankets off the bed, followed by the pillows then, after a moment of thought, tucked the large knife that had been concealed under both into his jeans.

When he reentered the living room, Clint was perched on the end of the couch cushions, still looking incredibly reluctant to become horizontal. Bruce placed the pillow and blankets around him instead, noticing as he finished that Clint was thumbing one hearing aid. “I’m guessing those need to come out?”

Clint made a non-committal noise, not making any move to remove the aid.

“I can stay here while you sleep,” Bruce offered. “I’ll wake you if anyone else tries to come in.” When Clint didn’t move, Bruce pulled the knife from his belt, offering it handle first. “Trade?”

After a moment, Clint removed both hearing aids as he gripped the knife, placing them in Bruce’s outstretched palm. His next words were so quiet that Bruce almost missed them. “Promise you’ll stay?”

“Yeah,” he said softly. “I’ll stay.”

“And will you wake me up if…”

Bruce could have selected any number of ways to finish that sentence. If someone came into the room. If his family arrived. If Clint had a nightmare.

“Yeah. I promise to wake you up.”

They seemed to be words Clint needed to hear, because he finally lay down, not resisting when Bruce threw a blanket over him and asked F.R.I.D.A.Y to dim the lights. He maneuvered one of the armchairs so he could sit while remaining in Clint’s eye line, pulling out his phone to pretend to be occupied.

Clint watched him for a while, eyes darting between him and the closed door before, at last, they fluttered closed. A few minutes later, his breathing evened out, and he was asleep. 

With a long exhale, Bruce got to his feet and made his way over to the kitchen, starting to remove the mugs from the sink so he could fill them with soapy water instead. While Clint obviously didn’t care if he lived in a pigsty, Laura might, and the least Bruce could do was ease the loss of the farmhouse in any small way he could.

Bruce took another look around the messy apartment. Sometimes it was still so strange to think about Clint, who initiated at least eighty percent of their prank wars and acted as he’d never met a dishwasher in his life, as a father of three kids _._

_Although,_ Bruce wondered, _maybe that’s the point._ The more he had gotten to know Clint, the more missions they had gone through where they had been beaten down until they couldn’t hide the cracks anymore, the more he realized that the clumsy, happy-go-lucky act was just that. He was never quite sure just how much of it was pretend and how much was genuine; which mask Clint would pull out of the arsenal whenever someone stepped a little too close to a trigger.

The whole thing sounded exhausting - not that that any of them exactly led restful lives.

At the reveal of the farmhouse, Bruce thought he finally had Clint sussed. That was the place where he could be himself; to finally take off all the disguises and rest. Now, glancing back at the unconscious agent sleeping on the floor, Bruce suspected he had had that wrong too. Not that he doubted Clint’s love for his family for a second, but maybe the loving husband and dedicated father was, at least in part, just one more performance. That maybe the real Clint Barton was the exhausted man who couldn’t sleep in his own bed or without a knife in his hand.

“This team is so messed up,” Bruce muttered, shutting off the water and dunking the mugs in to soak. There was only so much Bruce would be able to do without waking Clint up, hearing aids or not, but he could make a start at least. Wash the dishes. Clear the dining table. Tidy up some of the clutter on the floor.

He thought back to this morning, alone and pretending to make the best of it in his lab. Assuming everyone was off doing important things without him. Important things? Yes. Without him? Also, yes. But maybe…

Maybe everyone else in this Compound was just as lonely as he was. And if they weren’t going to come to him, maybe he could go to them.

Bruce grabbed a sponge, starting on the first mug. He couldn’t do all of it. No one could do all of it. But he could make a start and maybe, just maybe - that would be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Whumptoberverse will continue in [We Forgot to Break Up](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29798991/chapters/73308774)
> 
> You can check out my other Bruce & Natasha fic [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/23294671)


	5. Fanart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come check out this amazing artwork by [LovableKillerWhale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LovableKillerWhale/pseuds/LovableKillerWhalel%22)! (Who also writes wonderful MCU stories that are 3000% worth your time.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out the original on [DeviantArt](https://www.deviantart.com/orcaplayer/art/You-re-Enough-871716518?ga_submit_new=10%3A1614459479)

**Author's Note:**

> Come scream at me on [Tumblr](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/jinxquickfoot), especially if you also write fanfic or do fanart! Share your work with me!
> 
> If you're liking the work I'm putting out on Ao3 and want to support me as a creator elsewhere, it would mean the world to me if you were to check out/subscribe to my writing podcast 'Kill the Cat', which is available [here](https://linktr.ee/KilltheCatPodcast). We currently have two Marvel-related episodes out: one on [Infinity War](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ypaen3yM5Q&t=26s&ab_channel=KilltheCatPodcast) and one on [Jessica Jones](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mx8prgGgccc&t=26s&ab_channel=KilltheCatPodcast).
> 
> And hey. You’re enough.


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